Harry sat in the library doing his reading, which he always seemed to be a day or two behind on. He needed to return to taking notes to more easily review his past learning, given how much he was quickly forgetting. His quill wasn’t with his letters to answer where he usually kept it. On the spindly writing desk sat a tin of six bright new white quills. Harry stepped over and selected one after a brief deliberation.

Harry was finishing up a chapter when Snape came in and sat down with a sigh, clasped his hands before himself, and considered Harry as he scratched away in an old notebook. Harry closed up his books before addressing his guardian’s silent gaze.

“I am actually all finished with Hogwarts business,” Snape stated, tapping his fingers together idly.

“Congratulations,” Harry offered lightly.

After a moment Snape inquired, “How are you doing?”

“Good. Yesterday we did rejuvenation potions and curse averting charms as well as cursed object recognition, which was easy, and it was a nice break from getting kicked around practicing difficult counter-attacks we’ve barely learned,” Harry replied.

For the first time, Snape failed to verify that Rodgers was still being hard on him. “Would you like to do something?” Snape asked after another long pause.

“Er, like what?” Harry asked, surprised by the question.

Snape shrugged and tapped his fingers more. “What would one normally do on a sunny Friday?”

Harry thought about that. The world of possibilities was pretty broad if one considered everything. “How about the zoo?”

Befuddled, Snape echoed, “The zoo?”

Harry considered that it was his favorite place as a child. “Yeah,” he insisted. “Have you been to the zoo?”

“The rather well-populated one in Chester, a long time ago…to get an ingredient for a potion.” He shot Harry a haughty look.

“I won’t ask,” Harry said, grinning.

“Just lion whiskers…and they were rather easy with an Accio spell. Woke the lions up for once. Everyone became quite excited to actually see them up and moving.”

Harry chuckled. “So the zoo, then?”

Snape pushed himself to his feet. “Why not, Potter?” he breathed, sounding put-upon.

“Come on. It’ll be fun.” Harry happily putting his things away for later.

Despite having been there, Snape did not know an absolutely safe Apparition arrival spot. So on the second bus, the bus between Chester and the Zoo Harry dearly wished they had ridden the motorbike. Getting to the old part of Chester by Floo had been easy, but after that it was rather a hassle.

Eventually though, they were dropped off at the entrance. Past the gates Harry went immediately to the elephants. One of the great beasts stood very close to the tilted railing, dragging its trunk over the dusty ground to pick up stray bits of straw. After a time Snape said, “There is much to see, this being the largest of these things in the country.”

“Is it?” Harry asked, pulling himself from some reverie he had apparently fallen into. That meant it was a better zoo than any Dudley ever got to go to.

After passing over a bridge they were faced with signage promising far too many animals. One sign promised endangered dragons and Harry insisted on following that way. The dragons turned out to be of a very non-magical variety of lizard called Komodo dragons, although the sign insisted that their bite was rather nasty and could result in a slow, miserable death, somewhat redeeming the creatures.

Snape lead the way this time and after long stops at the Orangutans and Chimpanzees, they stepped into the cool, dark interior of the reptile house. Harry stopped before the boa constrictor and waited for a group of boisterous children to move out of hearing. Snape had apparently moved on as well because he wasn’t in sight either when Harry said hello to the snake.

The thick, coiled reptile raised its head and sniffed the air with its tongue. “My, you aren’t talking to me, are you?” the snake asked in an accent.

“You must have been born in Brazil,” Harry observed.

“Where else?” the snake asked, sounding a bit rude.

Harry shrugged and since a family with a toddler was fast approaching chasing the youngster, Harry moved on. It required a bit of wandering to locate his guardian, but he eventually found him before the glass niche of the Asiatic king cobra. He seemed to be studying it rather intently, tipping his head to the side and back the other way.

“Your kind of snake,” Harry said.

“Yes.” Snape turned away from the glass. “Make any new friends?” he asked a bit snarkily.

“No, actually.”

“Pity.”

Outside the reptile house, children were gathered around an ice cream stand. “That looks good,” Harry said of the treats going by gripped in small, happy hands. He fished in his pocket and came up with only Knuts and Sickles. “Got any Muggle money left?” Harry asked.

“You want me to buy you an ice cream?” Snape asked, sounding put-upon yet again.

“Yeah.” Harry tried hard not to grin.

“And you are how old now?” Snape said, although he went over to the stand and returned presently with a chocolate-dipped treat on a stick for Harry and a lemon ice for himself.

“Thanks,” Harry said, peeling the wrapper away and sighing at the wonderful frosty aroma inside.

“At anytime you may send Winky for such treats…”

“Not the same,” Harry insisted dismissively. The treat was melting fast in the sunshine, so Harry took a seat at an umbrella-shaded table. This also had the advantage of getting upwind of the camels. Snape pulled out the zoo map and sat across from him to eat his ice and peruse it.

“I am thinking that given the size of the orchid collection that a bit of ingredient collection may be in order.”

“Can’t take you anywhere,” Harry scolded with a grin and squinted into the sunny surroundings.

Snape’s brow furrowed as he turned the map over. “Are you enjoying yourself, Harry?”

“Very much, thanks.” Harry bit through half of the last of the treat surrounding the wooden stick and after swallowing, said, “You know, you seem…less like a parent and more like a friend now.”

Snape considered him before saying, “As long as you do not step out of line…”

Drawing the last of the hard chocolate and cream off the stick with his teeth, Harry muttered, “There is that.”

Sunday, Harry with trowel in hand, was putting the finishing touches on a repair to the garden wall when someone cleared her throat nearby. Quickly wiping wet mortar off his nose, Harry turned and found Elizabeth leaning on the gate. This reminded him that he had noticed last week that the hinges were coming loose from the wooden post, probably due to their excessive rusting away to wisps of metal.

“Hi,” Harry said, trying not to sound too welcoming.

“Haven’t seen you around,” Elizabeth said in a friendly tease.

“It’s been busy.” As he scraped off the trowel on the edge of the bucket, Harry fished for something to say. “How did your recital go?”

“Pretty good. Most people were impressed I’d even tried that piece.”

There was not much time to get water into the bucket to rinse it before the mortar set. Harry stared down at it, trying to decide how to approach this dilemma. He still dearly wished to avoid making trouble. “I have to get this washed out,” he explained, indicating the bucket.

“Okay,” she said brightly but frowned instantly after. When Harry reached the door, she asked, “Is something wrong?”

Harry turned back, scrubbing again at the smear of cement drying on his nose. “Nothing I can fix,” he admitted.

“What does that mean?” she asked, leaning over the gate to see him better. “What’s the matter?”

Waving the bucket again, Harry said, “I gotta go.” He didn’t give her a chance to speak further.

After cleaning up, Harry returned to the library. This time when he needed a quill he found the tin on the small desk so densely packed with swan quills it itself resembled a kind of bird. He blinked at it, trying to imagine what would necessitate owning so many quills. Snape was busy with a letter and Harry, rather than interrupt, simply pulled one out. He didn’t like that one, although he could not have expressed exactly why. It was brand new, bright, and unused, just like the others. He selected more carefully this time and moved to sit back on the lounger, but Snape’s voice brought him to a halt.

“Why did you choose that one?” Harry’s guardian asked with an unexpectedly sharp edge.

“What?”

Slowly, as though Harry were a First Year again: “Why, did you select that quill out of a tin of forty quills?”

Harry looked down at the feather in his hand, at the clean, professionally cut nib at the end of it. It flipped easily around in his fingers as he tried to understand the question. “I don’t know,” he replied, even though Snape seemed adamant about receiving a good answer.

Snape stood suddenly and clapped the small drawer to the tiny desk closed. “Come with me,” he ordered and stood up, pulling a bright purple book from a shelf on the way out.

Snape led the way upstairs to the disorderly storage room. “Stand there.”

Harry glanced uneasily at the pentagram on the floor. “Here? Why?”

Snape’s lips twitched ever so slightly. “Trust me, Harry.”

Shrugging internally, but still uneasy, Harry complied. The room suddenly felt colder in a bone chilling way not caused by drafty architecture.

Snape opened up the purple book Harry had seen him with the last few days and began to read aloud from it, “Fevered minds and Adepts both trod the plane which gives no consideration to distance as the spatial dweller experiences it.”

“Is this a spell?” Harry asked.

Snape paused and looked up. “No. Not yet, anyway. I am very curious about something.”

Harry, unaccustomed to being the focus of Snape’s studies, fell silent and watched his guardian’s dark eyes moving along the words beyond the veil of his hair. He read silently for two pages before lowering the book.

“Close your eyes,” Snape ordered. When Harry did so, Snape went on, “Do you remember the train ride through the Alps?” Harry nodded and Snape asked, “Do you remember the creatures you noticed in the depth of the rock?”

Harry did. He could not forget them, the sound of claws scrabbling on stone, the odd chittering. He gasped as he heard it again as though the creatures were right there in the room. Jerking in surprise, Harry jumped out of the diagram, heart rate escalating. He and Snape stared at each other until Snape calmly said, “Sensing them again?”

“Yes. Right over there.” Harry indicated the nearby wall with a wide gesture.

Snape took Harry’s shoulder and muttered offhandedly, “Well, that is southeast,” as he steered Harry back into the center of the diagram. “…if that possibly matters.” Harry swallowed hard and tensed, expecting that the creatures would return. Snape said, “Close your eyes again—Do not fret so. They cannot reach you…I don’t expect.” After a pause he added, “Do not summon them, in any event.”

“How would I?”

Snape, who had bent to the book again, paused and said offhandedly, “Well, you do not want them here, correct?” At Harry’s vigorous nod Snape dismissively added, “Simply continue to wish them to be elsewhere.” He went back to reading. Finally, he snapped the book closed and said, “Close your eyes. Remember the Dementors’ mind-web?” Harry nodded from behind his eyelids. “When you sense the Shetani—”

“Is that what they are?” Harry interrupted.

“It would seem so, your description is quite accurate. Nevertheless, when you sense them, is a similar web present?”

“No. With the Dementors I could feel the tethers. This is just like being in the same room or very close-by.” Harry stood tense, eyes closed, dearly hoping he would not hear the chittering again.

“Remain as you are,” Snape commanded. It sounded as though he were moving around as he spoke. Harry smelt burning wax, but he held still as instructed. A moment later he heard something else, sounding like a cloak dragging over a rough surface, like a Lethifold on the move, which made him turn his head around, open his eyes, and look out the door of the room. Before him was the ordinary hall illuminated by the ring of candles in the chandelier. Candles also burned at Harry’s feet, at each apex of the pentagram.

When Snape saw his alarm, he said, “I am rather certain you are not in danger right now, Harry. The Device is tuned more akin to a wireless than a gateway. What was that, by the way?”

“I don’t know,” Harry answered quietly. He wished to move out of this disturbing spot. “What are we doing?”

“I am most curious about something. Just a minute more. Close your eyes, relax your mind completely and open it to impressions, whatever impressions, harbor no assumptions… And tell me what happens.”

Harry did so. The room was quiet, only a distant car could be heard on the road outside. It was quiet enough that Harry could hear one of the candles flaming high beside his foot. Something shifted behind him, low, rustling as through dead grasses, even though only a stone floor was actually there. He didn’t turn this time, but relaxed into observing instead, let his thoughts cascade through dropping everything until there was nothing there.

In a dizzying sequence Harry imagined a dense old forest, an isolated island battered by waves, an endless vista of dunes and finally an old cobbled street. “I…” he began to explain, then gave up for lack of words.

“What do you sense?”

Harry couldn’t explain. Nervous with the strangeness of it all, he listened hard to the scrabbling movement behind him. But it wasn’t the only noise, many other things around him made noises. The chittering of the Shetani was just one of many sounds, he realized with a severe start. Things slithered, groaned, hissed, burbled, and worst of all, turned his way with queer, disquieting interest.

“Can I step out now?” Harry asked, voice wavering.

“Yes.”

With a barking exhale Harry tucked up his robe and stepped between the candles. The room returned to mundanity, leaving him dizzy with relief. Snape considered him expectantly. “That was really strange,” Harry said.

“What was it?” Snape asked, ducking to snuff the candles.

It was easier to speak without Snape’s eyes upon him. Harry said, “At first there were all these places, like stone streets, deserts, seas. Then it was just dark and all of these things were around me. I don’t know what they were. The Shetani, but also something like a Lethifold and loads of other creepy things. Hundreds or more of them,” he added, voice faltering again at the very notion.

Snape stood straight and placed the candles on the shelf where Harry had placed the skull. With the purple book in hand, he turned to Harry and said, “I am not certain how to tell you this.”

Thinking that sounded as though Snape were going to pronounce him to have some kind of terminal illness, Harry held his breath before prompting, “What?”

Snape sighed, appeared to consider flipping open the book but tucked it again under his arm instead. “You show signs of not only Astral but also Temporal Vision.”

“What does that mean?”

“Out of three bookmarks bearing various sleeping curses you chose the weakest. Out of six spoons you selected the only one not holding a cold metal charm, a charm often dual-classified as a curse. Out of six quills you selected the only one taken from a bird still living. Out of forty you still managed the same.”

Startled, Harry asked, “You’ve been testing me?”

“Yes. And you passed them all without conscious awareness,” Snape went on, sounding impressed and concerned in equal amounts. They considered each other while the wispy cinder scent of extinguished candles floated around them. Snape solemnly stated, “You are growing very strangely skilled, Harry.”

Mouth dry, Harry did not speak as he contemplated that in silence.

Snape pushed his straggly hair back and said, “You are gaining deep magicks, the old kind which Albus insisted you had potential for, usually when one of the staff would question his actions regarding you, either his overprotection or his complete lack of protection.”

Harry pushed aside the old memories that comment brought up. He knew he was very good at Defensive spells and all of the subduing spells, but he did not understand what this other power meant.

This time Snape did flip open the book after examining it. “Your experience with the Shetani induced me to order this book. It is a reprint of one written four hundred years ago. Most consider it to be either the product of madness or at best irrelevant to so-called ‘modern magic’.”

Harry’s mind worked fast around the words Snape was saying. “You don’t think the Shetani sensed…you know, some kind of remnant of Voldemort?”

“No.”

As much as Harry disliked imagining dark creatures trailing him because he carried some scent of the Dark Lord’s essence, it was worse to consider that they were attracted to him without.

Snape gave him a half-smile of reassurance. “I expect, although I am theorizing, that it was very early direct exposure to deep, powerful magicks that has left you with this potential. Infant and young childhood protective magic is of this class. It is considered a crude magic best overwritten by an education in formal magic, warped through heavy repetition to only manifest when it is intentionally focussed through a wand, significantly reducing accidental emergence.” He tilted his head. “As well as dampening the development of any other type of magic that threatens to be more interesting or fully rogue.”

Snape sighed. “Your early and lengthy exposure, coupled with the need for that protective magic to develop excessively in order for you to survive… That is why I believe you have developed thusly. The connections and visions you have been saddled with have not helped, I expect. They are forcing you to remain highly aware of that alternative energy, to encourage you to fine tune it.”

“It’s like wandless Hedge Wizard tricks, then? Except for the demons.” Harry looked around the room. “There were an awful lot of them.”

Snape continued as if lecturing, a calm rolling out of information. “The plane those creatures inhabit only exists with a loose regard to this world’s notion of place or distance. That is why you sense so many at a time.”

Harry nodded. Snape’s clarification at least explained why the room had seemed so very crowded with the things: he was sensing a whole world’s worth at once.

Snape flipped through the book, his gaze beyond the pages. With a regretful air, he shut it suddenly. “I cannot guide you through this…at least not with what I know at present. And unfortunately, no one has taken this sort of magic seriously in a very long time, so it is unclear where you might find guidance.”

Gesturing at the floor, Harry said, “But if I don’t step into a device, then…”

“You were not in one on the Swiss train, but you were in their territory,” Snape interrupted. More forcefully, he said, “An ordinary wizard would require a week of research in an extensive library in order to learn how to detect which quill out of forty was from a bird still living. This already exceptionally old book suggested that blind test for what it refers to as Olde Magery and I so doubted you would sense an anomaly in the feathers, I very nearly did not conduct it. I tested you twice because I believed you had beaten chance the first time.” He gave Harry yet another quirk of the lips and stepped closer. “Imagine my surprise when you dropped that feather with dismay and selected, from thirty nine others, the Radiant one, as this book refers to it.”

Harry pointed at the book. “Can I borrow that?” Snape immediately held it out. It was a heavy for its size, as though the paper were dense. Harry tucked it under his arm, pretending it was as light as it should have been. “Is there something, you…want me to do differently?”

Snape gestured for them to leave the room. “Dwelling in these skills will only aid their enlargement. Do keep that in mind. And as always, be watchful. ”

The dark creatures were the watchful ones, Harry thought with a shiver. On the stairs Harry said, “If I start hearing these things all the time, what should I do?”

“Get used to it, I would think,” was Snape’s dry reply.

Monday, Harry returned home from the Ministry and picked up his post from the table, including a reply from Penelope. When opened, it turned out to be longer than the last few letters from her and for a moment he feared she had indeed been offended. Instead, her tone implied she was touched to be asked for advice about a potential new girlfriend. Harry decided that she also probably didn’t mind reading about him having difficulties. She suggested he work out how to get Mr. Peterson to know him better, which did not have appeal. Penelope didn’t seem to believe that anyone could dislike Harry for long.

Her other point, which reminded Harry of yesterday’s encounter, insisted that he be at least somewhat honest with Elizabeth, rather than avoiding her, which was highly unfair. Harry again found that twist in his middle that strongly resisted causing a fight between father and daughter. She was right though, Harry would have to figure out something to tell her. Perhaps he should just tell her about Tara so that she would not harbor any romantic notions. Although, that might not make any difference to Elizabeth’s father.

Carrying the letter and his book bag, Harry stepped into the library to find Snape packing books into a small trunk. The date hit Harry hard as he realized August was fast drawing to a close.

“When do you return to school?” Harry asked, stashing the letter in the folder with others to be answered.

“I need a few days for last minute class preparation, so this upcoming weekend at the very latest.”

Harry considered that he should tell Ron and Hermione he wouldn’t meet them on Wednesday in order to spend more time with his guardian before he departed. Snape’s continuing interrupted his thoughts. “Minerva has indicated that she will arrange to cover my House occasionally so that I can return more weekends than I normally would—perhaps once a month or so.”

That didn’t sound very often to Harry, but he didn’t comment. Snape stood straight and rested one hand on his hip. “You will stay out of trouble, correct?”

“I’ll do my best,” Harry returned in a difficult tone. Snape turned back to his packing and Harry sat down with his books and tried to read, without much success.

When Snape headed out to shop for some potion stocks, Harry set his book aside and rested his chin on the heel of his hand. He had a home now, he considered, as well as an elf to take care of most everything. Really, he was doing quite well, he argued with himself.

Harry had just reopened his book when Snape reappeared with a stack of small brown boxes which he placed in the trunk. He then stood beside Harry and said, “Have you truly only read two pages in all this time?”

“I took a nap while you were out,” Harry explained flatly without looking up.

“Ah,” Snape said, apparently satisfied with that.

Harry’s silence at dinner eventually prompted his guardian to drum his fingers impatiently on the table while waiting for pudding. “This grim mood is not because I am departing, is it?” Snape challenged. When Harry merely shrugged, Snape said, “There isn’t any choice.”

Harry flipped his fork around in his fingers. “I’m used to having someone around to get spell help from,” he complained, ignoring his better sense to keep quiet.

Snape crossed his arms and said, “You may owl me at any time.”

“I’m not looking forward to coming home to an empty house.”

“Winky is always here and you may have friends over whenever you wish.”

Harry put his fork down. “True. Even overnight.”

“You are supposed to be avoiding trouble,” Snape commented sternly.

“Yeah, but how would you know?” Harry taunted.

Snape criticized, “Now you are behaving as a Slytherin would, Harry.”

Harry dropped his napkin on the table and departed the dining room, skipping the cobbler. In his room he started rearranging the books in his bedside stand, something he needed to do more often. He had finished with that and was making some random, messy notes for training out of a book on curse reducing amulets when Snape stepped in. Without speaking, he placed a plate holding a large square of cherry cobbler on the stand as well as a fork.

“You missed dessert,” Snape stated.

“Thanks,” Harry said.

“I’m beginning to believe this separation will be good for you.”

Harry took a bite of the cobbler, which had apparently been reheated for him, and said, “Yeah, I really should get back to remembering what it was like not having a parent.”

“Hm,” Snape said. “I suppose I should be grateful I don’t see this side of you often.”

“What side?” Harry demanded smartly.

“This difficult and selfish side.”

“The Slytherin side?” Harry taunted, putting his fork down rather loudly against the plate.

“Not precisely,” Snape said, his mouth flickering into a strange smile.

“What?” Harry snapped.

“You are behaving like your father,” Snape calmly observed.

Harry, without much thought, reached out to throw the plate at the far wall but his arm was caught and held firm before it reached the china. Still gripping him, Snape sat before Harry, also on the edge of the bed.

“It is difficult to know how to manage you when you are upset about something as striking as my departure.” When Harry gave in and relaxed, Snape released him. “But it is best for you. You are hanging onto odd aspects of childhood, I believe, to prolong needing a parent.”

Harry frowned, feeling embarrassed, prompting Snape to say, “That is more like it. At your age you should be railing against my presence, against my expressing any advice.”

“Who’s going to help me with my complicated blocks?” Harry complained. “And my hearing weird dark things around me.”

“There are any number of Aurors to assist you,” Snape pointed out.

“It isn’t the same.”

“I am just an owl away for advice and I believe that Christmas will be upon us far faster than you expect.” Snape sat straight and added, “You are a perfectly capable and it is past time you practiced at being so.”

“Yeah, I know. I just…I haven’t had enough chance…I don’t know.” Harry tossed his hands as he gave up explaining.

“A little time on your own at your age and you will be grateful to be unsupervised, I believe. But, please, do remain in control.”

Harry gave in. “I’ll try.”

During training the next day, they did leapfrogging drills. Rodgers, who now treated Harry with a brusqueness equal to that he used with the others, paced before them and said, “So, you are entering a building occupied by dangerous opponents. Each member involved in the engagement must advance separately under cover of the ones behind. At a clear sign from the leader, the farthest back will advance, leapfrogging ahead.” He had drawn a diagram on the board with arrows like a Quidditch play.

“Let’s give it a try in the corridor out here. I’ve warned everyone we are drilling.”

They went up and down the corridor until everyone remembered to only move on signal, and only move one at a time. Aaron had a habit of forgetting he wasn’t the last person and Vineet wasn’t much for staying low.

Rogan ribbed Harry a bit when he was briefly crouching in the doorway of the office. Harry just shrugged, refusing to be embarrassed. “Chasing Voldemort down the corridor, Harry?” Rogan prodded.

“I’ve chased Voldemort through the Ministry, thank you,” Harry replied primly.

Vineet passed him, leaving just Kerry Ann behind him. Practice was helping him keep track of everyone without effort.

“True,” Tonks agreed, stepping in and patting Harry on the head as she went by. With him crouching this was an easy thing to do. “No teasing the trainees, Rogan,” she chided.

Rogan pushed his chair back just as Kerry Ann passed, running agilely in a crouch. Rogan asked, “When do we get to duel them? That’s what I want to know. We just get to hear them bumping around in the training room all the time.”

“You want to duel Harry?” Tonks asked Rogan with a laugh. “Harry?”

“Anytime,” Harry breathed eagerly and at Aaron’s hand wave upward, he dashed away.

At lunch, the four of them sat around the workout room and ate, relaxed and warm after their running about. Aaron had taken to looking at Harry for long periods of time when Harry wasn’t looking back. As they ate, it was one of those times. Harry met his far away stare. “What is it?”

Aaron sighed. “I’ve been remembering all those times at school when Snape would lay into someone for a screw-up and as First or Second Years that would scare us whiter than the Bloody Baron.” He took a sip of his juice and went on, “But later, we’d laugh at ourselves, at how easily intimidated we were. Not that we stopped doing exactly what he said… Do you remember that?” he asked Kerry Ann.

Kerry Ann, looking sheepish, quietly said, “I never stopped being intimidated by him. No offense Harry. I was always really grateful I did well in Potions so he ignored me.”

They fell silent. Aaron eventually said, “But he really was… eh? What was he doing at Hogwarts then?”

“Spying for Dumbledore. Keeping track of Voldemort’s inner circle and their plans.”

Kerry Ann crumpled up her paper bag. The noise of it was unusually loud. “He got Marked just to help the Order?”

Reluctantly, Harry said, “Not exactly.”

She hesitated in tossing the brown paper ball into the corner rubbish bin. “That’s freaky, Harry,” she said, sounding judgmental.

Harry’s eyes narrowed as he thought of a retort. “Uh, oh,” Aaron said, distracting Harry, who immediately backed off on his anger.

“It’s hard to explain,” Harry said in a tone of apology. He glanced over at the silent Vineet, who was rolling up his empty lunch sack, face void of expression.

“Well,” Aaron said, standing and stretching his arms over his head and to the side, “I can’t tell you, of all people, to feel differently, but I keep getting the wobblies thinking about it all those years at school.”

“You don’t know him very well,” Harry insisted.

“As I recall, correctly…I think, he isn’t easy to get to know,” Aaron said. “Even as a Slytherin, if we asked him anything personal or said anything friendly to him, he would just sneer or glare, or worse yet, take you down with a biting insult. Unless you were one of his favorites.” He pushed his desk aside to clear the floor. “Hard to imagine anyone getting beyond that. He isn’t like that anymore?”

Harry stood and pushed his desk to the wall as well. It vibrated loud on the wood floor. “He can be. I just assume he wants space. And I don’t like people prying into me deeply either.”

The week went by too quickly. Harry peppered Snape with questions about all kinds of things, from: should he check the post for bills, to could he move some other books to the upstairs room to make space and could he use the desk in the drawing room. Snape sent Winky off and two hours later, Harry had a desk of his own in his room by the window. It was an old roll-top, its varnish sooty with age.

“Thanks,” Harry gratefully said when it was in place.

“We should have got you one sooner,” Snape insisted.

Harry pulled the top closed with a dull thud. “It’s going to be really quiet around here.”

“Invite friends over,” Snape said as though that were obvious.

“If I actually have all of my reading done…I’m going to miss getting help with my spells and my reading,” Harry went on, sounding down.

Snape spun with a swish of his robe. “You will survive,” he announced, as he departed the room.

Harry was dreaming. He dreamed that he was wandering through the graveyard in Godric’s Hollow, desperately looking for something. The place was devoid of life and movement, the air hung utterly still. The rows of stones appeared small and forlorn, print too deteriorated to read. The frosted grass crunched underfoot as Harry walked toward the tall, iron gate at the entrance. Fog snaked around the black metalwork, obscuring half of it. Harry passed through and onto the narrow, misty road.

“Severus!” Harry called out, wondering where Snape was. Harry’s voice sounded faint, sucked of life by the fog, even though he shouted loudly.

His cousins, Pamela and Patricia, stood in the road as he reached the crowded damp houses of the village proper. They argued that he shouldn’t be looking for Snape, that he wasn’t an appropriate guardian for Harry, that there was something not right about him. They told him that he should go back to the graveyard where he belonged. Harry argued with them, but they continued to insist that—because they were normal—they knew what was best. When Harry looked up and down the road, they quieted and watched him cautiously as he figured out what to do. The entire street was lined now with black iron gates, leading to houses, leading to stone walls. The tops all read something different but none of them made any sense. One read King’s Cross and another Hogsmeade.

“Why won’t you help me look for him?” Harry argued, hurt because he had thought they cared enough to do this for him.

“The legend should remain,” Pamela declared, as though in explanation.

Harry called out again as he walked away from them. But Pamela’s small children stood before him in the road, holding bundles of wands in each hand, too many to grasp in their small pudgy fingers. They watched him approach without any change in expression.

The sound of pounding feet woke Harry at the same time a furious scratching from one of the cages did. The door to his room flew open.

“Harry?” Snape asked in concern.

Harry grunted and shifted the stifling covers down. The dream flickered through his mind. “I was dreaming,” he explained groggily.

Snape reached the bed and turned up the lamp a little. “Oh,” he muttered, sounding relieved.

Across the room Hedwig fluffed herself and put her head under her wing. Beside her, Kali was clawing at the air through the bars, though she quit after a moment.

“Did I wake you?” Harry asked sleepily, rubbing his scalp.

“I would say,” Snape intoned dryly. He took up Harry’s dressing gown from the bed post and donned it over his gown before sitting down on the edge of the bed.

“Sorry,” Harry murmured.

“No matter,” Snape said dismissively. “You said you were having a nightmare?”

Harry thought over the dream. “More a dream than a nightmare. I just couldn’t find you.”

“That would explain your calling my name.”

“Uff, sorry.” He fluffed his pillow and set his head back on it.

“You already apologized.” Despite his snide tone, Snape reached a hand out and rested it on Harry’s shoulder. “You are all right?” Snape asked.

Harry shrugged his shoulder under the warm hand. The uneasiness from the dream hadn’t let him go yet and he was grateful for the contact.

“What was in your dream?” Snape prompted.

“I’m looking for you and it’s very important that I find you. I’m walking around Godric’s Hollow and my—”

“You were looking for me in Godric’s Hollow?” Snape said.

“Yes, and my cousins won’t help me look for you.” Harry left off the part about them believing it better for him not to find Snape. “I don’t know why I was dreaming it all,” Harry added. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“It is certainly all right,” Snape said in a dismissive and tired voice.

Sleep tugged at Harry, making him close his eyes. After a span of silence from his guardian, he put the dream aside in his mind, relaxed and allowed his head to fall to the side. The lamp glaring in his eyes went dim, down to a corona around the edge of the wick. As sleep pulled him down, vestiges of the dream made his arms convulse. The hand lifted from his shoulder and a moment later fingers pushed the hair back from his temple, then trailed again through his hair.

“Hogwarts is not so far away, Harry,” Snape intoned quietly.

Harry grunted in response, nearly asleep.

Snape sat back and considered his charge. The oblique orange light from the lamp gave the muscles in Harry’s shoulders and neck strong definition, accentuating the effects of his training, which, along with his solid jawline, made him appear fully adult. It perhaps explained why so many otherwise sensible young women would wait forever it seemed, for him to make up his mind. Snape could imagine feeling jealous, but after seeing his father’s petty jealousy, he was no longer tempted toward it. Pride was what one was supposed to feel at this and it was surprisingly easy to with this reminder of Harry’s continued dependence on him. He brushed at Harry’s errant fringe again, and the young man didn’t stir at all.

Almost inaudibly, Snape said, “I never imagined, Harry, that we would reach this point.”

Harry’s over-attachment was the sort of thing Snape would have expected to resent, but did not. He was beholden to Harry and it all seemed to balance out. Even though he could recreate old memories and feelings, he could not actually imagine things different from how they were now. The past was only a dimly thrown shadow across current existence.

The wind picked up the corners of the thin curtains on the window and seconds later, hard rain splattered onto the sill. Snape raised his wand and lowered the sash. Lightening flickered on the droplets dotting the panes and a rumble rattled them. Harry made a sound in his sleep and shifted as though dreaming again already.

Thursday morning, the day before Snape was to depart, Harry didn’t communicate much, mostly because he could not think of anything to discuss. He kept thinking of things they should plan to do like museums, or Quidditch, or the theatre, which were now not possible. Frowning, Harry finished his breakfast and collected his scattered books together.

“Have a good day, Harry,” Snape intoned as Harry stood before the hearth.

“Thanks,” Harry mumbled before departing. “You too.”

Snape watched the green flame retreat, sputter a few times around the grate, and then disappear. By next year Harry truly would be an independent adult, perhaps even moved out of Shrewsthorpe to more convenient London. But with an entire school year looming…June, and that eventuality, felt very far away indeed.

That evening, Snape finished rechecking his packed files and closed his trunk, hopefully for the last time. By hand he tugged the handle to drag it nearer to the door to the dining room and his stomach reminded him that it was well past dinnertime. Nine the tall clock in the hall read. Well past. That morning, Harry had not said when he was returning. Snape had assumed that like every other evening that week, Harry would forgo other activities and return straight home.

At nine-thirty, Snape went down to the kitchen for a cold sandwich. Winky made one up in short order and handed it to him, completely unnecessarily, on a tray. When he reached the balcony before his room, Snape could not resist checking Kali’s mood. Harry’s empathetic Chimrian was grooming herself sleepily. At his approach her head snapped up and sniffed the air interestedly. Snape gave her a chunk of cold roast which she eagerly devoured. This made Snape wonder why, if Harry was going to be late, he had not feed her at breakfast. Considering that if this were an ordinary evening, he wouldn’t have thought twice about Harry staying out late, Snape pushed his concern from his mind and retreated to his room to eat and relax with a book.

After one in the morning and another check of Kali, who was sleeping rather soundly, Snape began to feel anger. Harry’s quiet and abrupt behavior that morning now seemed a prelude to some kind of plotted difficulty. This felt in complete keeping with the Harry of the past, the one whose inability to conform to the most basic rules had many times put Harry himself, his friends, and even the entire Order at risk. Severely angry now, Snape stalked back to his room and went to sleep.

Morning came on, bringing Snape’s owl to the window with a letter from Candide. Snape had put her off to, he had expected, spend the evening with Harry. The note wished him a good school year and promised to make it into Hogsmeade as often as she could manage.

Harry’s bed had not been slept in, but Kali slumbered peacefully on. Hedwig fluffed herself and chewed on the wires of her cage, an entreaty to be released for a morning flight. Snape fetched her fresh water, but left her in her cage. Down in the kitchen Snape confronted Winky.

“Do you know where Master Harry is?”

“Winky not knowing, sir,” she squeaked as she added wood to the fire.

“Can you find him?”

“Winky not bonded to Master Harry. Only always find Master Harry in bonded master’s house.” She wiped her hands nervously on her tea towel. Her large eyes seemed to ask for forgiveness for not carrying out an order. “Master angry, but Winky not know. Winky not mean to be bad elf.”

In the dining room fury threatened to take Snape. He paced once, breathed out deeply and took up a parchment, intending to warn McGonagall that he may be late. Instead, he tossed the quill aside and paced several more times. Taking up the Floo powder instead, he contacted the Ministry Aurors office and insisted on speaking with Tonks, the only one there he was willing to explain things to.

“Hey, Severus,” Tonk’s head greeted him.

“Good morning. Have you seen Harry?”

“This morning?” Tonks asked, clearly confused.

A tiny cinder was pressing into Snape’s kneecap and impatiently he snapped, “Since last night.”

“No,” she said, implying further confusion. “Come over here where we can talk.”

Snape appeared in a hearth in the Atrium, since he could not travel directly to the secure hearth the Aurors used for communication. As he stalked to the lifts he began to have the first inklings of doubt.

“Harry didn’t come home last night?” Tonks asked through the cage as the lift came down to her level and before the gate could be opened.

“No.”

“Let me get a hold of the other apprentices, see if they know where he was off to.”

Snape waited with thin patience as Tonks used the office Floo to contact first Vineet, who insisted that Harry had been asking Kerry Ann’s advice about what shop to visit, then Kerry Ann. The apprentice Auror witch looked to have been woken up, but she squinted in thought as she floated in the magic fire and said, “Yeah, Harry wanted to buy a gift for his guardian…oh, hello sir. Uh, I suggested Manfred’s.”

“On Knockturn Alley?” Snape returned sharply.

“I go down there during the day sometimes. It is just the second shop in. How could Harry have a problem?” she said. She looked between them. “Do you need me to help look for him?”

“Yes,” Tonks said. “Come down as soon as you can.”

Tonks stood and considered the cold hearth in silence before saying, “Odd.” She then fetched Shacklebolt, the only other Auror on duty who was in the office.

“He didn’t show up at home yesterday afternoon?” Shacklebolt confirmed in surprise.

Snape, unable to find words to defend his only taking action now, nodded mutely.

Snape and Tonks walked up and down Knockturn Alley. Harry had indeed gone to Manfred’s and had been sent off with a gold-tinted, non-reactive, ultra-low-expansion glass cauldron. The shopkeeper behind the counter gestured at another just like it on a tall metal stand. Snape felt as though he had been kicked in the chest.

Tonks sounded far away as she asked in a mostly routine voice, “Did he say where he was going next?”

“Hm,” the older wizard muttered as he expansively rubbed his roughly shaven chin. “Mighta said somethin’ ’bout finding proper gift wrapping. Pretty sure he headed back out to Diagon. Positive even.” The man gestured with his thumb in the vague direction of Gringott’s.

After five hours of this, and all leads exhausted, Tonks insisted Snape return home to see if any messages had arrived and to take a needed break.

At home, there were no owls waiting and no post of interest. Kali was awake and blinked at him groggily before shaking herself and flapping her wings to get to the pedestal at the top of the cage. Snape opened the door, thinking that if she were still a juvenile, she might have grown antsy from the separation and lead him to Harry. She had no interest in leaving the cage and seemed disoriented. The door-knocker nearly made Snape jump when its tapping sounded from downstairs.

Snape went down to the door and yanked it open. A young woman he didn’t know stood on the slate path. Another woman, most likely her mother given the similarity, stood beside the gate with her arms crossed.

“Excuse me,” the young woman said. “Harry Potter lives here, correct?”

“Yes,” Snape murmured, trying to get a handle on her thoughts, they slipped away strangely.

“My name is Tara Terrance, I’m a friend of Harry’s. He was supposed to come over this afternoon for a picnic, but he didn’t show…”

Snape’s eyes narrowing may have brought her to a halt, because she stopped and closed her mouth. “Come in, won’t you?” Snape invited in a not particularly welcoming tone. The woman at the gate leaned on the wall, apparently prepared to wait without concern. As he led the way into the hall, Snape asked, “When did you last see Harry?”

“Yesterday evening, said he needed to find some silver and green gift paper.” Snape scoffed oddly and she hesitated before going on. “I ran out to Harrods for him and met him at the underground with it. He said he was in a hurry.”

“What station? No, just a moment. You should tell this to one of the Aurors.”

“Aurors? Is Harry missing?” she asked in shock.

Snape crouched before the hearth and said, “Yes,” in a pained voice.

Moody, unfortunately for Tara, was the one to appear. Tara backed up a step when she caught sight of his broad, distorted form coming out of the hearth and glanced at Snape in alarm.

“She has a bit more on Harry’s last whereabouts,” Snape explained before pacing away to let Moody take over.

In halting speech Tara repeated her story. Moody listened and then fixed her with his magic eye. “You a squib my dear or just a Muggle?”

Snape turned at that in surprise, as Tara said, “I’m a Squib. Both my mum and dad have some magic.”

Snape rubbed his head while shaking it. He was certainly not going to make it to the staff dinner and needed to owl McGonagall. Digging out a quill from the stand on the sideboard, he jotted out a quick note and went to fetch Franklin to take it away.

“You done with her?” Moody asked.

Snape turned and with a last glance over Tara, said, “Yes.”

Moody showed her to the door where she halted and asked the Auror. “That’s Harry guardian, right?”

“Yes,” Moody replied in a tone that made it clear only limited questions were allowed.

She swallowed. “Do you think he’s angry Harry’s dating me…I mean, someone without magic?”

“I don’t think ’e cares about anything ’cept finding Harry. You think of anything, owl the Ministry or here, whichever is closer.”

With a sad frown she nodded and stepped out the door. Moody closed it again on the scene of Tara’s mum putting her arm around her daughter. “Constant vigilance,” he muttered.